President Xi Jinping on Sept 26 vowed strong support for Interpol with practical measures, including helping 100 developing countries build or upgrade communication systems and crime labs in the next five years, so the law enforcement cooperative can raise its global influence and leadership.

China hopes to work closely with countries and international organizations on global security, and jointly build universal security for humankind, Xi said in his keynote address at the opening of the 86th Interpol General Assembly in Beijing.

The president said that China had made remarkable progress in combating crimes of various kinds and building its crime-prevention system.

“More and more people believe China is one of the most secure countries in the world, which is an important contribution China has made to the world,” he said.

Xi calls on nation to achieve rejuvenation

President Xi Jinping called on the whole country to raise its spirits and make persistent efforts to achieve the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation as the Communist Party of China (CPC) prepares for its 19th National Congress, scheduled to open on Oct 18.

Xi, also general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, made the remark on Sept 25 while visiting an exhibition at the Beijing Exhibition Hall. It was held to showcase the country’s progress in the past five years under the leadership of the CPC with Xi as the core.

Since the Party’s 18th National Congress held in November 2012, the CPC has led the people of the country to achieve long-term development of socialism with Chinese characteristics, improve the people’s livelihood, and produce historic reform of the Party and the country, Xi said.

Railway connection to sea speeds up cargoes

A new rail-to-sea logistics link connecting inland China with Southeast Asian countries opened on Sept 25 as a train loaded with auto parts and fiberglass products left the Tuanjiecun Railway Station in Southwest China’s Chongqing.

The train was to arrive at Qinzhou Port in the southern Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, where the products will be shuttled on to Singapore and other countries.

Compared with the traditional route via the Yangtze River and Shanghai, the new one will save about 20 days. The two-way train service runs once a week.

In January last year, China and Singapore launched an effort to link western China and Southeast Asia through Chongqing.

New eyeball in space peers toward Earth

China’s most advanced weather satellite officially began operating 36,000 kilometers above the Earth on Sept 25, greatly improving the country’s capabilities in weather forecasting, environmental monitoring and disaster prevention and relief. It is also expected to help China’s response to climate change.

The 5.4-metric-ton Fengyun 4A, developed by the Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology, lifted off on Dec 11 atop a Long March 3B carrier rocket from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in Southwest China’s Sichuan province.

During its shakedown period, the satellite performed well and generated good-quality images and data, according to a news release from the State Administration for Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense, which oversees the satellite project.

It said the Fengyun 4A can be used to detect and monitor typhoons, sandstorms, rainstorms and smog.

The satellite is expected to be in service for more than six years.

National parks to be established by 2020

China released on Sept 26 an overall plan on the development and management of national parks, which calls for the strictest measures to protect the country’s natural beauty and pass it on to generations to come.

By 2020, China will formally set up a batch of national parks and establish a new national department to take charge of the comprehensive management of these parks, according to the plan. By 2030, the system will be further improved and the management more efficient, it said.

As one of the most important areas in natural reserves, the national parks will receive the strictest protection, according to the plan jointly released by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council, China’s cabinet.

“The national parks are owned by the State, shared by the people and passed on to future generations ... as precious natural legacies,” the plan said.

Innovators told they can help relations

Innovation cooperation between China and the United States has provided great opportunities for the people of both nations, Vice-Premier Liu Yandong said on Sept 25.

Liu’s first stop on her visit to the US was the 2017 China-US Young Maker Summit and China-US Youth Innovation Center inauguration ceremony on Sept 25 at New York University (NYU). The event was part of the China-US Social and People-to-People Dialogue.

Liu visited the work exhibited at the China-US Young Maker Competition from NYU and Chinese universities, accompanied by NYU president, Andrew Hamilton.

“Innovation cooperation is one of the most dynamic and the most highlighted components of people-to-people exchanges between China and the US,” Liu said.

“Both Chinese and American people are all very creative,” Liu said. “The US has been the center of global technological innovation, and today’s China has put innovation as the primary driving force, implementing the strategy of innovation-driven development.”

Kissinger says Sino-US ties crucial for peace

Former US secretary of state Henry Kissinger, who has described the US-China relationship as the “defining” relationship of the 21st century, said on Sept 26 that both sides need to work together for “peace and human progress”.

“It will be imperative that we work together to lift our relationship from the pragmatic and from the day-to-day solving of problems to the conceptual, to the creation of a new encompassing concept of a world order that promotes peace and human progress, as we are now doing on the Korean issue,” Kissinger said at the opening ceremony of the US-China University Presidents and Think Tank Forum at Columbia University in New York.

Shanghai firm makes amphibious drone

A Chinese company has produced the world’s first unmanned, amphibious commercial aircraft, with plans to use it to deliver goods, transport supplies to islands and detect submarines, according to the manufacturer.

Liu Jiandong, founder and chairman of UVS Intelligence System, a privately owned drone-maker in Shanghai, said mass production of its U650 seaplane has begun and it will enter commercial operation this year with a Chinese express delivery company and a client in Southeast Asia.

He declined to name the buyers, citing business confidentiality, but said both contracts had “considerable value”.

“We are working with the domestic client to apply for approval from air traffic management authorities of our plan to open a freight route next year using the amphibious drone,” he said.

The U650 is based on Spain’s Colyaer Freedom S100 amphibious ultralight aircraft, whose intellectual property rights were wholly acquired by the Shanghai company, according to UVS.

Xi’s book published in Italian and Albanian

Italian government officials hailed President Xi Jinping’s view that development must be conducted in a “peaceful, civilized and harmonious way”, calling it the foundation for global development, as the Italian edition of Xi Jinping: The Governance of China was presented in Italy’s Senate of the Republic recently.

The book has now been translated into 23 languages, with the Italian edition launched in Rome and the Albanian edition launched in Tirana. According to its publisher, the Foreign Languages Press, the book has sold more than 6.5 million copies in 160 countries and regions since it was first published in September 2014.

Pietro Grasso, president of the Italian Senate, praised Xi’s book for its focus on “reforms, sustainable development, fighting corruption, diplomatic relations and so on”.

Li Ruiyu, the Chinese ambassador to Italy, said Sino-Italian relations are the best they have ever been, making it the perfect time to release the book, which is expected to help Italians get to know China better.

Friendship helps build demonstration farm

Agriculture is especially important to the people of China and the United States, and agricultural cooperation contributes to stronger ties between the two countries, the US ambassador to China said at a launch ceremony of a demonstration farm on Sept 23.

The China-US Friendship Demonstration Farm, in Luanping county, North China’s Hebei province, covers an area of about 1,330 hectares. It is modeled after a farm near Maxwell in the US state of Iowa, owned by Rick and Martha Kimberley and their son Grant.

“The farm … stands as an example of how we can exchange information and ideas, and maintain a growing and improving trade relationship,” said Ambassador Terry Branstad, a former governor of Iowa.

In his speech, Branstad recalled his interactions with President Xi Jinping dating to 1985, when Xi led an agricultural delegation from Hebei province to Iowa when Branstad was governor.

Li urges US to provide level playing field

China urged the United States to provide a level playing field for Chinese enterprises investing there and to loosen restrictions on high-tech products being sold to China, Premier Li Keqiang said on Sept 25.

Li made the remarks during his meeting with US Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross in Beijing.

The premier said bilateral relations have been progressing well and communication at different levels has also progressed on track.

Li said that China, being the world’s largest developing country, and the US, the world’s largest developed country, are also the largest trade partners with each other.

“So I think it is fair to say that our common interests far outweigh our difference or divergence. Economic and trade relations between the two countries have always served as a ballast stone for the overall bilateral relationship,” Li said.

Japanese PM joins gala by Chinese embassy

In a rare move, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe showed up and said “good evening” in Chinese at the Chinese embassy’s gala marking the 68th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China on Sept 28 in Tokyo.

Abe told a full house of nearly 2,000 people that he will work hard to make the trilateral summit meeting for leaders of China, Japan and the Republic of Korea possible in Japan this year to improve his country’s relations with Beijing.

The Sept 28 event also marked the 45th anniversary of the normalization of diplomatic relations between China and Japan on

Sept 29.

Abe, the first Japanese prime minister to attend such a ceremony in 15 years, was accompanied by other Japanese officials and politicians, such as Foreign Minister Taro Kono and the ruling Liberal Democratic Party’s secretary-general, Toshihiro Nikai.